50 questions fic meme

[lizbee]

This one's a whopper, so I'm splitting it up over a few days. 

1. What was the first fandom you got involved in?

Star Trek: Voyager. I discovered fic when I stumbled upon the J/C Index (not an archive, just an index!) when I was fifteen. I'd read about slashfic in books about fandom (NERD), but I was amazed and excited to learn that it existed for het pairings, too.

2. What is your latest fandom?

Star Trek: Discovery. I've come to terms with it, I guess.

3. What is the best fandom you’ve ever been involved in?

It's cheating to say Disco, because the show has barely been around long enough to generate any drama or unpleasantness that's touched me. But spacefungusparty is a delight. 

Otherwise, probably Avatar: The Last Airbender -- because I got into it long after the canon had closed, and all the disputes  and shipping wars had largely died down. What a nice, chill fandom, I thought!

Then Legend of Korra premiered...

4. Do you regret getting involved in any fandoms?

No, but I regret my behaviour in some. 

5. Which fandoms have you written fanfiction for?

*clears throat*

• Star Trek: Voyager
• Buffy: the Vampire Slayer
• Angel
• The West Wing
• Firefly
• Mary Russell
• Doctor Who
• ...the guys in the FanLib ad
• Avatar: the Last Airbender
• Legend of Korra
• Star Trek: Discovery

I may have missed a couple. 

I flirted with multifandom in the early '00s, but eventually figured out that I was happiest, and did my best writing, when I was concentrating on one fandom.

Which doesn't mean I'm only reading, watching and thinking about that fandom! The one great thing about Tumblr is that it makes it quite easy to reblog stuff for Thing You Like Consuming But Don't Create For. (People who create sideblogs for every interest they have confuse me.)

6. List your OTP from each fandom you’ve been involved in.

NO THERE ARE TOO MANY

7. List your NoTPs from each fandom you’ve been in.

While there are many, many, many pairings I really don't care about or enjoy, I only have three NoTPs across all of my fandoms: 

• Zuko/Katara
• Doctor/Rose
• Doctor/Clara

BY COINCIDENCE, they all involve an aristocratic man "raising" a "common" woman to her "rightful" place, and usually come with a whole mountain of issues, very few of which are explored in a way I find interesting or palatable. 

8. How did you get involved in your latest fandom?

"I guess I'll watch the new Star Trek," I said. "I'm sure it won't be any good, but I like the cast, and I'm really keen to see a Trek centred around a woman of colour as the lead."

Two hours and a flurry of text messages between yiquiqie and I later, I said, "Gosh, that was quite good. I can't see myself becoming A Fan, but I sure do have a lot of opinions."

Five weeks later, at approximately 11:14 pm, I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, going, "I thought I'd enjoy 'Lethe' for Sarek, and I did, but I also can't stop thinking about Admiral Cornwell?"

Two days after that: "...there's a very clear scenario in my head and maybe I need to write it down?"

9. What are the best things about your current fandom?

• most people seem really nice
• there's some pretty great fic out there
• and some stupidly talented artists
• and vidders
• being able to put my hand up on Tumblr and go, "I know this just means it's a day ending in Y, but I'm having a lot of feelings about Admiral Cornwell right now", and I won't be the only one
• PS I KNOW THIS JUST MEANS IT'S A DAY ENDING IN Y BUT I'M HAVING A LOT OF FEELINGS ABOUT ADMIRAL CORNWELL RIGHT NOW
• I've never gotten into a fandom this early before, and it's interesting to be able to watch firsthand as ideas evolve into fanon, which will soon turn into the cliches we want to deconstruct, and from the deconstructions, new fanon will evolve

10. Is there a fandom you read fic from but don’t write in?

I like reading Star Wars fic, but I don't write it. (See above re being monofannish as a writer.) I'm quite fond of Reylo, and of AUs where everything goes terribly wrong, but in a different way to how it goes terribly wrong in canon. 

Comments

[nostalgia]

BY COINCIDENCE, they all involve an aristocratic man "raising" a "common" woman to her "rightful" place, and usually come with a whole mountain of issues, very few of which are explored in a way I find interesting or palatable.

Do you think they have to be or is it just fandom spinning them that way? From what I remember there was a disturbing thread of (sometimes internalised) classism in Doctor/Rose stuff back in the day, where her family just Weren't Good Enough and the Doctor had to make her an actual literal alien for her to achieve her true potential. I do think RTD planted some of that, but fandom gleefully ran with it. I can't remember ever reading anything where the Doctor chose to live Rose's life, it always had to be on his terms because her working-class existence just wasn't acceptable to the writer and the only good resolution for the lower classes is to leave their background behind and become space-aristocracy.

...I shall stop now, you know what I'm like when I get started on this shit. XD

[lizbee]

Do you think they have to be or is it just fandom spinning them that way?

I think it's very much fandom imposing that interpretation. RTD's depiction of the working class was NOT GOOD, but it was still more nuanced than what we wound up with in fandom.

I can't remember ever reading anything where the Doctor chose to live Rose's life...

Literally the only one I can recall was written by you.

[nostalgia]

And I only wrote that one out of spite!

[goss]

they all involve an aristocratic man "raising" a "common" woman to her "rightful" place

In general, I find Doctor/any companion not my cup of tea, due in part to the above.

Does Reylo fic tend to have any of this dynamic? Just wondering, since I'm sorta-maybe curious about that ship, but haven't gone looking for fic as yet.

Interestingly, I'm also ship-curious about Zuko/Katara, and now as I'm typing this out, my brain is making little parallels between the two sets of characters. *g*

[lizbee]

Does Reylo fic tend to have any of this dynamic? Just wondering, since I'm sorta-maybe curious about that ship, but haven't gone looking for fic as yet.

It had some, particularly before TLJ, but these days it's more a dynamic of "meeting in the middle via different kinds of hard work on both sides". (But I might have a selection bias there, because I'm far more likely to read a fic where Ben Solo winds up an isolated scavenger on a desert planet atoning for his crimes amidst the sand, who occasionally hooks up with Eccentric Jedi Rey than "Ben inherits the throne of Naboo* and Rey is his queen".)

* Yes, I know it's a democratically elected monarchy, but, you know.

[rj_anderson]

Amazingly little, actually (and I say this as somebody who has read Great Walloping Wads of Reylo fic, including earth-based AU's, which have never interested me in other fandoms). There has always been a strain of "Renperor" fic in which Kylo is either a figurehead monarch installed by Snoke or has otherwise become Emperor somehow, and Rey either turns Dark or pretends to do so in order to save her friends and becomes his queen, but it's quite easy to find lots to read without dipping into those. They certainly don't make up the majority of fics, they're just a subgenre.

Before TLJ there were a lot of "they get stranded on a planet together under horrible conditions and have to rely on one another to stay alive" fics, as well as "they keep meeting up, fighting and failing to kill each other that they gradually realize they're in love" fics. Obviously the emphasis on trying to get these supposed Mortal Enemies to reconcile has diminished now that the film just had Rey make herself up pretty and ship herself to Kylo in a box. :D

If you want really well written and plotted multi-chapter (including novel-length) canonverse or near-canon Reylo fics you should probably check out Diasterisms and/or Nymja on Ao3.

[goss]

Thanks! Always good to have reliable recs when dipping toes into a fandom for the first time. :)

[archangelbeth]

I think I wrote a Zutara, only it was kind of dubious-consent angrysex. And also he'd been captured and imprisoned by Earth Kingdom forces. (It was an AU where the whole "we go to the Earth King and cast down his secret police dude and everything WORKS" was kind of handwaved in the background.)

...I liked Zutara ideas early on, but then I got more invested in the canon ship, really.

(I do like me a good Reylo crackfic, though that's the complete opposite of what I'm hoping for in canon. (Platonic Best Frenemies!) ...unfortunately for me, the only Reylo I'm really invested in is on hiatus while Gardening Season is upon the author, I think. https://archiveofourown.org/works/13271934/chapters/30367044 -- unfinished. *sniffle* I hope the author will return to it.)

[kelly_chambliss]

I discovered fic when I stumbled upon the J/C Index

My first encounter with VOY fic, too!

[nenya_kanadka]

It is indeed a day ending in Y and I, too, have feelings about Admiral Cornwell! :D I am DELIGHTED at how for once I am not alone in my big fandom crush. It's really quite amazing.

Also that was very mch my trajectory (except my thoughts after the pilots were more "WTF WTF. But. I can't give up now, I need to see if it doesn't suck!" Yes to Lethe. Jesus Christ, that episode. And that wait while we thought Kat might be dead....well, you were there. You know about all our screaming. ❤Damn.

Agree too on the fascinating experience of getting into a fandom so early on. I tend to come in ten years late with Starbucks for the reruns, so this is really interesting.

And cool. Idk what happened. But Disco stole my damn heart. DID NOT EXPECT